Trying To Recover Gear, Landscaper Jumps Onto Fleeing Thieves' Pickup

Delray Beach — Landscaper Jeff Price was tending to the last lawn of the day when he saw men outside his open equipment trailer.

"Yeah, let's take it," he heard one of them say.

The four men loaded two weed cutters, a chainsaw and a full gas can onto their Chevy 1500 pickup about 5 p.m. Friday in the 200 block of Northeast 22nd Street, police said. Price, 29, ran at them, screaming.

"Instinctively, I just ran and made as much noise as I could and was as aggressive as I could be," Price said Saturday.

The thieves got into their truck and tried to flee, but Price, a former Coast Guard petty officer, latched onto the hood of the Chevy.

"If you give me back my stuff, I won't call the police," he said.

But the driver pressed the gas pedal, police said, moving the pickup forward about 100 feet. The driver then stopped the pickup abruptly, trying to shake Price off. But he didn't budge.

He was screaming at them, reaching into the truck and trying to pull one of the men out, but getting only his cell phone.

The thieves then backed up about 200 feet, with Price still on the hood, he said.

His knee was caught under the bumper at one point and swelled to "the size of a football," Price said.

A thief in the back tossed out the weed cutters before Price fell from the hood.

The thieves escaped with the chainsaw worth $200 and a can containing gas worth $50, Price said.

It could have been worse if they had taken more from his trailer, he said.

"In this economy, I could have been out of business," said Price, who has run The Price is Right Landscaping Inc. in Delray Beach for five years.

He is sorry he left the trailer unlocked but had no regrets about chasing the thieves, despite his swollen knee.

"I'm tired of the smaller people getting picked on," Price said. "I'd do it again in a heartbeat."